A Hard Day's Knight
by t dawg
Summary: A bloody murder in the upper class suburbs surrounding Gotham City plunges two detectives into a case that may be just the tip of the iceberg! And what about the Darknight Detective? Read on to unravel the mystery of a Hard Day's Knight!


It was hot tonight. The late August air carried that heavy, oppressive feeling along with a sticky quality that instantly covered skin in a damp sheen of sweat. In the suburbs of the upper-class community nestled in the low hills that encircled the city like a defensive barrier, there was very little physical activity. Dogs panted heavily as they walked on the end of expensive leashes that cost their owners more than most families spend on food to feed themselves in a week. The owners, who had meant to "get out and enjoy some fresh night air," were now thinking twice about taking King George or Noodles the Poodle out for a walk under the harsh streetlights.  


Robert Bumsfield watched Cerberus, his purebred golden lab, hike his leg over the bushes surrounding the elegant, Victorian-style home of the Dough family. Bob considered stopping Cerbie, as he was fondly known to his two boys, but then remembered last Christmas and George Dough's party; a party he had neglected to invite Bob and his family to, though the Bumsfields had lived here for ten years and the Doughs had only arrived last fall.   


So when Cerbie moved on to a row of tulips planted painstakingly by Mrs. Dough herself (the fact that she planted all these "beautiful flora" on her own steam was one she never neglected to mention when chatting with her lady's group of which Bob's wife was a part, though Bob had seen Mrs. Dough countless times sitting on a lawn chair tanning whilst an underpaid yard-boy hacked away at the soil, her only involvement scolding the boy when he put a flower too far to one side of where she had instructed him), Bob watched with interest as several of the tulips withered under the dog's assault.  
His head snapped up as he saw the silhouette of Mrs. Dough's plump figure appear in an upstairs window and wave spasmodically at him. Shit, he though to himself. She'll probably get her prick husband to sue me. Quickly he turned his head to the dark side of the street just incase she hadn't gotten a clear look at his face in the past five minutes he'd been standing out front like a damn lawn ornament.   


"C'mon, Cerbie, let's go home," he said to the dog, giving the leash a sharp tug back in the direction of their house. Cerberus looked up at him with big brown eyes and obediently began to trot back up the street. 

***

Betty Dough was in her early forties and enjoyed food. Her figure, she kept telling herself, was fine. A little on the plump side, but not enough to concern her. She had married rich, divorced richer, and married again even richer still. Now she and her husband had enjoyed a quiet life up here in the hills for nearly a year and she was forty-two years old with more money that she knew what to do with, a Mercedes, two country club memberships, and her husband was still decent in bed. She was content with her life the way it was and to hell with any of these snotty little trophy wives who dared call her anything but beautiful. Food made her happy.  


The microwave clock was the only illumination in the dark, downstairs kitchen. Their housekeeper had gone home for the night so when Betty, reading a Stephen King novel in bed beside her husband who was intently soaking up SportsCenter on ESPN, was struck by a craving for more of the lobster salad Camille had served for supper, she was forced to fetch it herself.  
The clock read 10:15 as Betty gracefully maneuvered around the countertop that split the kitchen nearly in half. The fridge was on the far side of the room. It was a big side-by-side model that had all the newest innovations. She quietly opened the door and the light popped on. She somehow found the light of the fridge comforting, as a moth drawn to a flame finds comfort in its heat. Burnt-out refrigerator bulbs were a pet peeve of hers, in fact-  


She stopped in mid thought as she felt a whiff of air on her back. She righted herself, her brow furrowing in thought. She half turned towards the darkness of the kitchen like a hound cocking its head to one side. Nothing. She gave a mental shrug of her shoulders and resumed her search for the lobster salad. After a few moments she drew the ornate glass bowl from the shelf and placed it on the countertop. It took her a good three minutes to find a salad dish and fork in the darkness and another minute to fork over the necessary portion. She replaced the bowl in the fridge, poured herself a small glass of milk, and quickly mounted the stairs.   


SportsCenter was drawing to a close as she walked down the upstairs hall to the bedroom at the far end. The door was shut, but not latched, a small ray of light escaping the tiny crack along the edge. Funny, she thought. Thought I left the door open. Using her ample backside to her advantage, she nudged open the door and with the same grace displayed downstairs swiveled a half turn and moved to set her snack on her bedside table. It took her a second to realize that George, who had propped himself up in a sitting position to better watch the television, was now slumped over, his throat cut from ear to ear. Blood was still pouring from the fresh wound, soaking the sheets. His bulging, surprised eyes stared blankly at a far wall.   
Oh, God, she thought even as she heard the silenced pop and a sharp bee sting between her shoulder blades. They've found us. All this running and hiding, and they still found us. She was stumbling now, towards the window, the only chance she had to let someone know, let anyone know that somehow, despite all the precautions, they had been found. She was still waving frantically at the man whose dog was doing its business on her tulips even as the second bullet sunk into the base of her neck.  


It was the end of a long, hot week. The weathermen were forecasting a break in the heat, but by the end of the month the thermometers would be right back up there. As it was, the police station's air conditioning units were running full-blast twenty-four hours a day. With such heavy usage, and given the unerring abilities such devices posses to fail at precisely the wrong time, it only made sense that there would be problems. Breakdowns. Like the one they were experiencing now, the one that caused Detective Ernie Farnsworth to wipe his receding hairline with an already damp handkerchief. The window fan of his spacious, yet claustrophobic office made such horrendous shuddering and squeaking noises that normal conversation was impossible. Not that there was much to talk about.  


It was Friday. The two victims had been killed on Wednesday evening. About 10:45 that night, 911 had received a call from the hills that a man and wife had been murdered. The police had found the house, a large, Victorian building, and the man who had made the call, a Mr. Bumsfield. They quickly sealed the house off and Mr. Bumsfield was taken in for a statement. Detective Farnsworth was among those sent to do the investigation of the house.   


They had discovered a downstairs window open, with a clean-cut circle cut into the glass where the murderer could have reached in to unlatch the windows. The glass circle was found lying in the grass a few yards from the porch, as if just casually tossed there. The house itself was relatively undisturbed. Nothing visible to the naked eye was missing; there were no visible footprints. The crime scene itself was the master bedroom upstairs. Farnsworth could easily see why Mr. Bumsfield had been so incredibly shaken when he had met the first police cruiser. George Dough was propped against the headboard of the bed in a sitting position, though his head lolled to one side, his eyes bugging from their sockets. His throat was sliced open where the neck met the folds of skin that hung below his chin. Blood soaked the front of his nightshirt and most of the upper half of the bed. Upon a closer examination it was discovered that Mr. Dough's tongue had been cut out, leaving only a bloody stump in the back of his throat. The autopsy would later reveal that the strained condition of jaw muscles and pieces of tissue recovered on Mr. Dough's teeth that the tongue had been cut out while he was still alive.  


Mrs. Dough was lying on her stomach near the first of two windows facing the street. Her arms were splayed wide, and blood matted her curly brown hair to the back of her neck, where the first bullet wound was found. A second wound was discovered in the small of her back. Her autopsy showed the lower bullet had missed her spinal column by centimeters, and it was presumed she had been hit first in the back, staggered to the window, made the waving motions Mr. Bumsfield said he saw from the street, and was then shot in the back of the neck. This second bullet had struck her where the first had missed; death was instantaneous. A large bowl of salad was found spilled just inside the door and milk soaked into the carpet not far away. Farnsworth stood in the middle of this carnage thinking. Coroners were lifting the bodies into black plastic bags and there were four officers in this room dusting for prints. Amid all the clutter, he tried to piece the scene together in his mind.   
The killer must have killed Mr. Dough first, and Mrs. Dough was out of the room. Neither of the two bodies showed immediate signs of being beaten: no bruises, welts, or broken bones. He must have been fast, fast enough and quiet enough to cut out Mr. Dough's tongue, slice his throat, and hide before Mrs. Dough could come back from . . . where? The kitchen. The salad and milk. She had brought them upstairs, seen the killer . . . no, not seen the killer. The first wound was in her back. But she could have turned to run and then the killer shot her. No, she wouldn't have run away from the door. So the killer was hiding behind something, the door, maybe, she saw her husband's body and at the same time had been shot. Dropped the food. Went to the window, waved. Then was shot again.   


It doesn't matter, Farnsworth told himself. They're both dead. Both murdered and murdered in a very cold, professional way. It doesn't matter how they died, the fact was they were dead. Just then, Farnsworth's younger partner, Detective Ron Mills, had come up beside him.  
"A hit?" he asked. Farnsworth considered.  
"Until we prove otherwise," he checked his watch. "Yeah, I'd say it was a hit. Solid clean, and professional. Did you find an exit downstairs?'  
"Nope." Mills rubbed his eyes. "Hey, what time is it?" Farnsworth checked his watch again.   
"Just short of midnight."  
"Great. Anything special up here?"  
"Just found out Mr. George Dough had his tongue cut out."  
"Jesus Christ." Mills gave a low whistle. "Was he alive?"  
"Can't tell." Farnsworth tilted his head to one side and popped his neck. "We'll have to wait for the coroner's autopsy report. But I'd say he was. This has the mafia written all over it. I've seen it a hundred times. Only trouble is, most of the cases I've worked on like this, the victim was a thug or lowlife who couldn't pay back his loan shark. Sometimes a higher-ranking member of a rival family. But never quite like this." He thought a moment. "Ron?"  
"Yeah?" the younger man looked up from examining the woman's lower back wound.  
"Run a check on George and Betty Dough. See what comes up. I'm talking about a criminal record George might have, or maybe a kid of theirs is in with the mob. If you can, check the feds' records and see if they have any kind of WITSEC program on these two or anyone they might know. I'm planning to take my vacation at the end of this month so I'd like to have this one in the bag before then."  
"Oh, well, I wouldn't want to inconvenience you, would I?" Mills grinned.   
"Keep talking like that and I'll retract your invitation to our big Halloween pig roast," Farnsworth said, only half-serious.   
"Yeah, yeah. Ok, I'll get on that as soon as I take a friggin' nap. Meantime, what do you plan to do?"  
"Tonight I plan to go home and have a romantic supper of Maine lobster tail with my wife, carry her upstairs, light some candles, and make sweep love to her until the sun wakes our peacefully slumbering bodies and we make love again."  
"You mean you'll go home, take a quick shower, and collapse into bed beside her where you'll both sleep fitfully until 5 a.m when her alarm rings and she goes to work and you sleep 'till about 9 then come into the office and see what I've dug up so far?" Mills scratched his balls.  
"Piss off," Farnsworth walked out of the room, Mills right behind him. "A man can dream can't he?"  
"Yeah, well," Mills said as they climbed into their car. "My dreams always involve me and these two Asian girls, right? Y'know? And one, she's got this pair of handcuffs and the other one has this jar of marmalade, right? And then . . ."  
"Shut up, Ronald." Farnsworth started the engine and they sped into the night. 

Now Farnsworth sat as his desk two days later as late afternoon sun streamed through the windows and his fan labored against the sweltering heat. Two days he and Mills had searched. Farnsworth had interviewed most of the neighbors on the street while Mills worked his way through the massive police and FBI WITSEC database. Farnsworth had talked to Bob Bumsfield who had discovered the bodies. He talked to everyone and got the same story: they had money to burn and were slightly on the snobby side, but there was nothing dishonest or sleazy about them. Mr. Dough's caddy even pointed out that Dough was an excellent tipper, and Mrs. Dough's yard boy was never gypped out of the money he deserved. Credit and bank records were excellent, Mills reported. The only thing remotely out of the ordinary was that every account George Dough had was opened in September of last year.  
"It's like he had millions of dollars just laying around in mason jars." Mills had said. "And then a few months ago thought it'd be a good idea to put it in a bank. Weird."  


This had so far had been the only hiccup in the otherwise normal life of the Doughs. So the most puzzling aspect of this case remained that bitch of a question: why? Farnsworth had worked the Homicide division for eight years, and this was a hit if he'd ever seen one. No fingerprints were recovered and the only footprints found were blank, so the killer had either used shoes without any sort of tread or used duct tape to cover it. The cut on Mr. Dough's throat was very clean and precise. The wounds in Mrs. Dough were inflicted with deadly accuracy. The autopsy had confirmed Farnsworth's suspicions that Mr. Dough had been alive when his tongue was cut out. The bullets recovered from the woman's body had so far been unidentifiable by local traces. No doubt, Farnsworth told himself. It was a hit, and a very professional, very expensive one at that.  
Farnsworth was mulling over this when Mills knocked on the door then slunk into the room. He looked tired; dark patches were under his eyes and his sandy blond hair was greasy and unkempt. He had a huge mug of coffee in his left hand. He collapsed into a chair and stared at Farnsworth blankly.  
"We finally got a trace on those bullets," he finally said.  
"Really? How?" Farnsworth leaned across the desk, interested.  
"Gordon's sources had the bullets in a bag along with the report laying right on the commissioner's desk this morning." Mills shook his head. "I don't know how he does it, man."  
"He's good, Ron. But we shouldn't need his help anymore cracking this one. So talk to me."  
"Ok." Mills gulped his coffee, grimaced, and continued. "The bullets were traced to a gun called a Wolfram P2K. Ever heard of it?"  
"Uh-uh."  
"You shouldn't have." Mills took another drink. "The P2K is an advanced pistol from Germany. Designed for use by the German police, it's not in widespread service just yet. They have an optional silencer, fire caseless 9mm ammunition. Not the most powerful gun in the world, but rapid and precise."  
"The kind of gun an assassin would use." Farnsworth sat back.  
"Not to mention the kind that would not exist on this side of the Atlantic Ocean. The Doughs must have took a major piss in someone's pool to get this kind of triple A service. Any leads there?"  
"Zilch." Farnsworth yawned. "The Doughs were legally squeaky clean. Tell me more about the gun. Did you find the registry for it?"  
"Ah," Mills said. "We got some unexpected help on that one." At that moment two men in dark suits walked through the door.   
"We did," one of them said as they pulled up two of the remaining chairs.  
"Farnsworth, um, these guys are Feds." Mills said. Farnsworth eyed the newcomers. Both were tall and broad shouldered with matching crew cuts. Their dark suits were finely pressed. Both were sweating profusely. This was not a day for navy and black.   
"That true?" Farnsworth asked.  
"Yes, it's correct. We've already told your partner everything I'm about to say, and I only wish I could tell you more." He smiled a thin, nasty smile. "That model of gun is owned only by a handful of people in the world. The only known possessor in this hemisphere is a man by the name of Nigel Wilheilm. He's a retired Colonel in the German army. His dossier as a professional mercenary and assassin is thick as a Bible. Everything from training troops to murdering high-ranking government officials is in there. He's never been captured but surveillance agencies have confirmed that he is in the United States, though his last confirmed location was in Miami."  
"That's wonderful." Farnsworth said. "But it really doesn't get us anywhere, does it?"  
"Detective," the other one spoke now. "Are you familiar with the Campirelli family?"  
"Maybe, why?" he asked.  
"They're one of the largest crime families in the world. Involved in pretty much anything that's illegal from political bribery to running guns, their main base of operations is right here in the city. The fact that they brought in a major figure like Wilheilm to make this hit points to something big on the horizon."  
"Or it means the Doughs were just very bad people." Farnsworth said. "Well, I feel more enlightened now that you have told me nothing. My job is to find who killed the Doughs, not get in the middle of an FBI fisticuff with the Mafia. Do you have any useful information? Like what they did to deserve what they got? Why their bank accounts are less than a year old? We've come up with nothing illegal in their records and neighbors and friends had nothing suspicious to report. Do you guys have a different story to tell?"  
"Detective," said the first. "I said I wish I could tell you more." Almost in unison the two agents rose to their feet and walked out the door.  
"Hey, wait a sec-." Farnsworth jumped out of his chair, but they were already gone. "Damn," he muttered. He looked down at Mills. The younger man was slumped in his chair, fast asleep. 

  
The city woke with the night. Bright lights transformed the teeming metropolis into a blanket of stars amid a dark countryside. Nightclubs and bars that were dormant during the day yawned bright flashing neon yawns as they stretched and prepared to face another Friday night. Acoustic guitar duos sang ballads about fruit in coffee shops and bookstores while punk kids with nipple rings, spiked blue hair, and cheap electric guitars screamed about suicide and teen angst for their peers in underground basement clubs.  


Farnsworth and Mills had reached the end of a long day at the end of a long week. After the feds had left Farnsworth had visited the commissioner who had told him that the feds were cracking down on the Campirelli family and this Nigel Wilheilm was the key.   
It was 11:37 as Mills, looking more haggard than ever, came into Farnsworth's office. With a smirk of triumph he tossed a manila file onto Farnsworth's desk.  
"Got 'em." He grinned.  
"What's this?" Farnsworth asked, opening the file.  
"The Doughs. You aren't gonna believe this." He began to talk very excitedly. "Check this out: George and Betty Dough, a.k.a William and Valerie Moss. Normal high-class folks living in New York, right? The man had an outstanding job at a law firm and the woman taught dance classes, and both were supposedly killed when their house burned down. William and Valerie Moss, a.k.a Thomas and Francine Pullman. Your average redneck hicks living in BFE, right? The man drove a meat truck, the woman worked at a local convenience store. Apparently Thomas drove more than frozen meat, right? He was a low-level Campirelli man who made special 'pickups' for his bosses. Transporting mafia men on the run from the law, guns, drugs, and even dead bodies. He knew transport routes, drop-off places, and the names and faces of several high-ranking family members. He was one of their most trusted employees.  
"Until he talked to the feds." Mills concluded.  
"Y'know," Farnsworth pointed to his glasses. "These work." He skimmed over the paper again. "Why'd they move from New York to here?"  
"It was a plan the feds had to throw the Campirelli's off their trail. See, the mob knew about the Pullmans' move to NY. With the information given by the Pullmans, the feds had arrested mafia bigwig Frank Lazlow, but he couldn't be taken to trial without the testimony of Thomas Pullman. So the mafia decided they had to off the Pullmans before the trial. The feds were one step ahead of them, though. They faked Thomas and Francine's death and moved them here and changed their names yet again. The mafia knew it was a scam but never found the Pullman's new location. A month after that Lazlow mysteriously died in a car crash on his way to a pretrial."  
"I remember that." Farnsworth said. "It was all over the news. It's obvious that the Campirellis found 'em somehow, so the most important question now is how."  
"This is what the feds weren't telling us." Mills sighed. "Somehow the FBI's Witness Protection data has gotten out in the open. It's for sale to the highest bidder, and God only knows how many people the Campirelli's want dead can be found on that list."  
"So the FBI is in town just to bury the whole thing?" Farnsworth shook his head. "Then they were right about Wilheilm. He's the key to all of this. If the son of a bitch talks, they could move on the Campirelli family and from them on up to whoever is behind all of this. Good job, kid. Where'd you get all this?"  
"Gordon's source again."  
"Bullshit." Farnsworth said. "Haven't I told you to stay away from that? Pretty soon you'll be as far up his ass as Gordon."  
"Yeah well, I don't see the problem with using him. After all, he never had to help us." Mills said.   
"I'll tell you the problem, Ron." Farnsworth said. "I've seen way to many cops grow to depend on him and then get shot one night when he doesn't show. He's not God, Ron. He's only one man. And there's only a certain amount of trust that you can put there."   
"I know, man." Mills said. "But being there with him, it's hard not to feel . . . spooky. Y'know what I mean? I mean, to wonder what's going on in his head-" The desk phone rang. Farnsworth's hand snapped out to pick it up.  
"Yeah?" He listened for a moment. "Great. Just great. What? Sure, no problem." Farnsworth hung up the phone.  
"What's up?" Mills asked. Farnsworth was already up and heading towards the door, gun going into his shoulder holster.  
"Firefight up on Thirteenth Avenue. Some nightclub. That was the commissioner telling me that our pal Nigel was followed into the club. I guess the feds blew their cover or something. Let's go."

The siren blared loudly but the red light seemed lackluster in comparison to the bright corridor of lights they were driving through. Farnsworth swerved through traffic, threading his way up the street.  
"You do know that by the time we get there this thing'll be over with, right?" Mills said.  
"Our job is to arrest Nigel Wileilm for the murder of George and Betty Dough."  
"You mean Thomas and Francine Pullman."  
"Whoever the hell they are, this scumbag killed them. He's our case, Ron." Farnsworth braked as they came to a ring of police cars. They jumped out of the car and flashed their badges to an officer who had moved to intercept them. He could see that the club occupied the lower two floors of a ten-story building. The neon palette bathed the entire crime scene in a hue that made everything look . . . unreal. Like a comic book, he thought. The upper part of the building was very dark, silhouetted against the night sky by the thousands of other clubs and bars almost exactly like this one.  


Farnsworth could hear loud techno rave music over the cacophony of the police sirens, but no gunfire. He elbowed his way through the dense crowd and saw an ambulance backed up to the door of the club. The large plate glass window at the front of the club was shattered, and Farnsworth could see overturned tables and broken glass beyond. Somebody blessedly turned the music off, leaving the scene eerily quiet. Medics were wheeling two bodies out of the club; he recognized them as the two FBI agents who were in his office earlier that day. He couldn't tell if they were still alive. Mills came up behind him.  
"Any sign of Nigel?" he asked.  
"None." Farnsworth said. "But they're putting Special Agents Johnson & Johnson into that ambulance there," he pointed, "and there's no sign of anyone in there," he pointed again, "so my guess is he got away."  
"Then what's that?" Mills pointed up. In the glow of the lights from the club Farnsworth could see something moving on the roof of the building. A shape like a man. A running man. He ran back towards the police cars.  
"LIGHT, LIGHT! ANYBODY GOT A SEARCHLIGHT!?" he screamed. Police officers and bystanders gawked at him. Some even ducked, thinking the madman from inside was at it again. He found the closest police cruiser with a small light attached to the roof. The window was rolled down.  
Somebody dropped the ball here, he thought absently. Anybody could just waltz up to this thing and grab the shotgun lying in the front seat. He leaned in the car and flicked the light on, pointing it up to the top of the building. For a moment the beam swerved erratically, then slowed down to a more systematic search. When he found what he was looking for the crowd of onlookers began to murmur and point.   


The body of a man hung suspended by a thin black cable from the roof of the building. He swung lazily back and forth, his feet pointed to the sky and his head at the ground. His hands were tied to his back and he didn't appear to be moving. Farnsworth though he saw a rustling in the shadows on the roof, but when he moved the searchlight up there the roof was empty.  
"Want me to send somebody to get him down?" Mills asked. Farnsworth stood there for a minute, staring up at the swinging body. God damn you, his lips tightened in a low, simmering anger.  
"Yeah, sure. Go with them and be very careful." He replied tiredly. Suddenly, he just didn't care anymore.   
"No problem." Mills said, and disappeared into the crowd.

  
The man's name was Nigel Wilheilm. His body had been found swinging from the roof of the El Noche Azul nightclub. When Mills hauled him up onto the roof, Wilhielm could barely stand. His eyes were wide and his face a pale white. On his body had been found a gun that matched the description of the Wolfram P2K, a wallet that identified him as Raymond Villars, a book of matches from the Diamond Lion Casino, a large pocketknife, and five thousand dollars in cash. They had confiscated all this, of course, and now Wilheilm had been sitting in the interrogation room with nothing but the walls for company for four hours.   
Wilheilm drummed his fingers on the table. He was a tall man with medium build. His hair was bleached blond and he had a tuft of hair under his bottom lip. Soul patches, aren't they? Farnsworth asked himself. He and Mills stood outside watching him through the one-way window, along with a small contingent of other officers and detectives. The assassin leaned back in his chair and stretched leisurely. Then he looked right at the mirror and grinned a smug, nasty grin.

"You know we'll never get him to talk." Mills said to Farnsworth.   
"Oh, we will eventually." Farnsworth casually tossed the thought aside, like it wasn't important. Mills had noticed Farnsworth's nonchalant, almost apathetic behavior ever since the body on the roof had been found. "You've never done an interrogation before, have you?"  
"Not really." Mills said. "I've been to a couple but never actually . . . you know, questioned anybody."  
"Well, we'll let him cook for a while longer. We've been steadily raising the temperature in there for the last hour and a half. His lawyer won't be here until morning, so we have plenty of time to wear him down. If he still ain't talking the commissioner will just bring the trump card into play."  
"No way." Mills said. "He can't do that."  
"Yes he can." Farnsworth snapped at him. "I didn't say I liked the idea. I never have. Remember what I said about trust? I didn't join this force to let someone else do my work. It makes us look so ineffective you wonder why the Mayor doesn't decide to just screw the GCPD and let him take care of everything."  
"But you said it yourself. He's only one man, and-" Mills trailed off. The door to the interrogation room swung slowly open and a shadow calmly walked into the room. Farnsworth had seen him plenty of times before, but there was always that tightening in his gut, that twinge of . . . unease. There was something unsettling about it, alright; the very idea was just so morbid that any sane person couldn't help but feel uneasy around this shadow of a human being.   
He's bigger in person, Farnsworth thought to himself. It's like he's larger than life. Well, he corrected himself. In a lot of ways, he is.   
The scalloped black cape trailed the floor behind him. He stopped by the desk and talked with them for a few moments. Farnsworth didn't hear much of what he had to say, but the other guys were staring at him in rapt attention. The officer closest to the door reached out and pressed a button. A buzzer sounded as the heavy internal lock unlatched. Wilheilm looked up, his grin broadening.   


A heavy, gloved hand reached out and opened the door, and as he stepped into the room, Farnsworth could see Nigel's eyes bug almost out of their sockets and his leer twisted into something much less pleasant. The door shut with a loud BANG.  
Farnsworth looked down at the manilla folder he had open before him. It was the file he and Mills spent all week on. It had transcripts of Farnsworth's interviews, crime scene records, autopsy reports, banking and credit records, Mr. Bumsfield's statement, and lastly the information Mills had spend all day extracting from the expansive database. He looked around the room. The tape recorders were running and the other officers were watching through the glass intently. Farnsworth looked back at the file. Closing the folder, he turned towards the door.   
"Hey, where are you going, Ern?" Mills asked. "We got him!" From inside the room they heard a muffled scream.  
"No we don't." Farnsworth said under his breath. We don't, he thought to himself, because we are officially no longer necessary. It's in his hands now, and he'll take care of it. He always does. That's how it works, being a cop in Gotham City. Living in the shadow of the Bat.   
He looked back at Mills. "There's nothing more for us to do here, Ron. We are officially no longer necessary." There was another muffled scream and some sobbing.  
"So," Mills asked again. "Where are you going?"  
"Home to my wife." Farnsworth tossed the manila folder into a wastebasket by the door. "But first I think I'll run by the all night grocery. See if I can get some Maine lobster tail."

  
end  



End file.
